cheerfully living on less

How to make fluffy homemade hamburger buns

Several years ago, I posted a recipe for homemade hamburger buns, but of late, I’ve been slightly modifying the dough from my honey-glazed rolls to make buns because I think they’re slightly fluffier and more delicious.

In fact, these are so good, I might almost prefer one over a doughnut.

I’m going to give you a recipe for 24 buns, because while you’re at it, you might as well make a bunch. If you don’t eat them in a few days like we do, you can always freeze some for later.

Feel free to halve the recipe, though, if 24 buns is way too many for you!

So, in a mixer bowl, combine 3 cups of flour and two packages of yeast (that’s 4.5 teaspoons.)

Then heat together your milk, fat, sweetener, and salt until it reaches 120° F.

You can use whatever kind of fat you prefer…butter is the tastiest, but vegetable oils work fine too (if you use coconut oil, use the refined kind so your buns don’t taste super tropical!).

You can also vary the sweetener. Sugar works, but so does honey.

Add the hot liquids to the flour/yeast and beat for two minutes. This will make a really thin batter.

Next, add two eggs, and enough of the remaining flour to make a soft dough (the recipe calls for 7 cups total and at this point I’d added a little shy of six cups.)

Don’t err on the side of adding too much flour-this is probably the most common mistake beginning bakers make. Tough yeast dough won’t rise well because the yeast isn’t strong enough to push against really stiff dough.

Tough dough is the enemy of fluffiness.

Flour your counter and dump the dough out.

FYI, I could have made this dough a hair stiffer than I did. If you’re new to kneading, you might want to add just a bit more flour than this before you knead or you’ll have difficulty handling the dough.

To start the kneading off, I run the dough scraper around the edge of the dough, folding the floury edges into the middle.

Once I do that, the dough is usually quite manageable. I knead my dough for about three minutes or so, only adding flour to the underside/outside of the dough, never to the middle.

It should look something like this when you’re done. See how it flattens out a bit? Your dough should be soft enough to do that. If it stays in a tall round ball, it’s too stiff.

You should need right about 7 cups of flour, with a little extra for dusting the counter. However, the amount of flour you need will depend a bit on the humidity levels in your home, so if you need to use a little more or a little less, don’t worry about it. Yeast baking isn’t terribly exact when it comes to flour.

Put the dough back into the mixing bowl (I don’t bother washing mine!) and cover it with a wet tea towel.

Let it rise in a warm place for an hour.

Once it’s risen, punch it down, turn it out onto the counter, and divide it into 24 pieces.

Shape each pieces into a ball, and then flatten the ball slightly.

To shape my dough into balls, I place a piece of dough in my hand and pull the outer edges to the middle.

You can sort of see how I did that if you look at the third dough piece in the picture below.

From left to right, there’s a piece of unshaped dough, the top of a shaped ball, the bottom of a shaped ball, and a flattened dough ball.

Place the buns onto two greased baking sheets (I have two Vollrath baking sheets, and I totally dig them. So incredibly sturdy.)

I do cover my dough with a towel in other circumstances, but sometimes, the towel can stick to small items like buns, so I like to put these into my oven, uncovered, with a bowl of steaming water below them. This keeps the air warm and moist, which is the point of the tea towel anyway.

This also is a handy way to give your dough a warm place to rise during the winter, when the air in your house is a little on the cool side.

The buns will probably take about 45 minutes to rise, although if you’re making them in the summer, they could be done rising in as little as 30 minutes. It all depends how warm the air is.

They should look like this when they’re done rising, though.

About 10 minutes before the buns are done rising (take them out of the oven first!!!), preheat your oven to 350°F. Once the oven is hot, bake the buns for 13-15 minutes, or until they’re nicely browned.

Remove them to a wire rack to cool.

On wire racks: I used to own two cheap and terrible racks, but I now own two of these Professional Cross Wire Cooling Racks. I love them because they should last forever and because they fit perfectly in my half-sheet pans. And the cross-hatch pattern of the wires means nothing can sag between them.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine 3 cups of flour with the yeast. In a separate bowl, combine milk, butter, sugar, and salt, and heat (stovetop or microwave) to 120°F.

Add hot liquids to flour/yeast mixture and beat for 2 minutes. Add eggs and mix to combine. Add enough additional flour to make a soft dough.

Turn dough out onto floured surface and knead for 3-5 minutes. Place dough in bowl, cover with wet tea towel, and let rise in a warm place for one hour, or until doubled in size.

Turn dough out on to floured surface and divide into 24 pieces. Shape each into a ball and flatten slightly. Place on greased baking sheets; cover baking sheets or place into oven with a bowl of warm water below. Let rise 30-60 minutes or until doubled in size.

Remove rising buns from the oven and preheat oven to 350° F. Bake buns, one sheet at a time, for 13-15 minutes, or until lightly browned. Remove from pans and cool on wire rack.

Comments

I’m totally going to try these. Thank you for the tip about too much flour. I’ve been scared to make yeast breads since the one time I tried as a newlywed…yummy little golf balls, they were. Now I’m motivated!!

These look delicious! For now I am dairy-free (I am nursing and my daughter seems to be lactose intolerant), do you know if substituting another liquid (water?) for the milk would work? Thanks so much!

Could you use lactose-free milk? Alternatively a dairy-free milk (almond milk, for example) might work, or you could always use water as well. Water will give you a slightly less soft product, but it should still be pretty darn delicious!

We have dairy (and nut) allergies at our house. I usually substitute soymilk for the milk or ricemilk. We use earth balance as well for spread and that works fine instead of butter. I find that oil works good for small amounts, say 1-2 TBSP, but if there is more than that called for in a recipe, I usually use the Earth Balance (or Smart Balance).

Thanks. I read SandyH’s comment below about weighing her dough–honestly, when I eyeball things I am SO far off! I have the same problem with cutting cake slices evenly so I must just be proportion-impaired. This would be one time when my “good enough” tendencies might be improved by weighing it out so I get fairly close to the same size buns.

That’s so interesting, because I usually feel like big loaves are more complicated than small breads for most people…it just seems like there are more rising/baking issues to face with a big lump of dough than a small one.

I really hope these work out well for you! Just don’t add too much flour and be patient with the rising time, and they should be nice and fluffy.

My perfection-hungry self uses my digital kitchen scale to weigh the dough, at least for the first cut in half.. I’m amazed at how far off I’ve been by eye balling it. Now I have to say I only bother when it’s Thanksgiving and/or I’m taking the rolls for a special event…for “just us” eyeballing is what I do…mostly…

oh Kristen! Your site is always the highlight to my day! I have crockpot BBQ pork on the menu this week but had no buns/rolls so was just going to go with a baked potato or such for our starch. My rolls have not turned out very fluffy in the past so I have shied away from making them. The product always ends up coarse and dense. Your awesome tutorial has re-inspired me (as you always do!) and I am going to try these tomorrow. Thank you for saving me (hopefully!) from a trip to the store.

You could also use half the amount of instant yeast and let it have an overnight rise in the fridge. That’s how I prefer to make bread, I think it has a better flavor, less yeasty( if that makes sense).

Wow!! These are seriously delish. Thank God I did 1/2 sweet buns and the other sandwich tolls bcz I’d be making another batch right now for sandwiches otherwise. SO soft and light. Thanks!!
So easy I will make these for a party. Everyone loves “my” (your breads mostly) but we host 45-60 at our family gatherings! Now these, I can do all at once;)

I just took them out of the oven! They are so beautiful and feel so light! I can’t wait to taste them. I can tell that these rolls will be better than any others I’ve ever made. Thank you for this fabulous recipe!

I had to send another comment. I just tasted one of the rolls, and they are the best, lightest tasting rolls I have ever made! Just gorgeous. I used that Platinum yeast made by Red Star and the dough rose so well, thank you again for this recipe.

I have the dough rising on my counter as I type this. This is my second time making them and it will be my go-to recipe from now on. Love them! Its time consuming but well worth the effort. Thanks so much for the detailed directions and pictures. I really enjoy your blog—thanks for all the time and work you put into your posts!

Awesome!! I halved the recipe and used the dough cycle on my bread machine, then baked in the oven (Cuz sometimes I’m lazy like that.) We had them with hamburgers last night, and I may, or may not have eaten one just slathered with butter. Love your blog, thanks Kristen!!

Wow! These really are fluffy! As fluffy maybe fluffier than the store kind with no preservatives or conditioners!! Woot!!
I thought it impossible but low and behold they taste great too.
My skinny kids age 6-ate 4 and age 2 ate 3!!
With a good portion of protien, veg and milk. 6-year old pleaded for one in her lunch tomorrow.
Normally, i do not get the full number a recipe says because I like big buns (and I cannot lie! Lol) anyway…. These did 24 large buns. I cooked all at one time on 350 convection, switched racks and turned around in middle. Took 3 extra minutes. Thank you. My new go-to bun. I think the store lost a custoner on these.
Note: i gave extras to neighbors. The dough was difficult to work with by hand. Use the scraper or metal spatula. I used about an extra cup flour during knead. My rise times were short in oven on warm.

Defrosted bread usually not great. Do I really want to freeze extras? Not sure. So thats why my neighbors got lucky. They raved about it.

I just tried this recipe, my dough is in a bowl on the counter right now,hopefully rising. I have to say, it was a little complicated. Everything was going great until I poured my dough onto a floured surface and tried to knead. I swear, everything looked just like your pictures up to that point, including the dough I poured out onto the counter. That’s when the trouble started. No matter how much flour I kept trying to fold in with my spatula, it was just way too sticky and wet. When I tried to knead it was just a wet, sticky mess. I had dough everywhere! I finally had to pour everything back in the mixing bowl and add more flour. I’m now hoping I didn’t add too much flour and the buns will still be soft. Did anyone else have this problem?

Update:
Just wanted to let you know regardless of the mess with the dough, the buns turned out great! My kids loved then! We had them for supper last night with a Lentil Cauliflower soup recipe I made. Then we all took sandwiches for lunch today. I froze the leftover buns and plan to take out only as many as needed for lunches on a daily basis, otherwise I fear my kids will eat them all up in a day!

I finally had a chance to make these yesterday, and my family thanks you. These are wonderful. I was concerned about adding too much flour or over kneading, and I was sure I had messed them up, but no! They worked and they are delicious! Right out of the oven they taste amazing with a bit of butter. With a hamburger, oh wow, they compliment the flavor perfectly. My family LOVED them and I will be making them regularly from now on. Thank you for the recipe and the blog post, it really helped in the making of them.

Wow. All I can say is… Wow. I kneaded a little long (forgot to add the sugar and salt during the mixing process) but it still turned out gorgeous. So fluffy with just the right amount of chew and excellent flavor. I think with just a touch more kneading this could make a pretty respectable sandwich bread, too. Looking forward to making some whole wheat buns when my boyf and I polish these off.

I can’t find a good hamburger bun recipe without eggs! My son is allergic to eggs and I have tried a few so far that have not turned out well at all. Any idea if there is a way to do this without eggs?

Have you ever tried this recipe with half the sugar? My father is missing the enzyme to digest sugar so anything with over 1 gram per serving can make him very sick. That also means sugar substitutes, he can’t even eat peas, corn or carrots for example. Unfortunately the last bread he was able to eat just went to 4 grams per serving so I have been scouring the internet trying to come up with alternatives for him.
Thank you.

Wow, these are fantastic, but even better the great detailed dough instructions and photos. For the first time, I succeeded in getting a real second rise from my dough. The rolls are actually a bit too fluffy for my taste (this issue should be easy to correct), and would make super dinner rolls if you keep them small. Frugal Girl, you are the best!

I was a bit worried when I started kneading the dough that it was too sticky.
Adding flour worked great and they turned out awesome. Hate to say it,
but better than the buns my mom used to make! Great job!! Thanks

Hello,
I have had terrible experiences with hamburger rolls and buns and anything like that in the past. I can not make small little things. Only my regular old loaves of bread ever turn out well.
I recently moved across the country and since moving nothing I bake has been turning out well at all. I don’t know if it’s the altitude or flour or yeast or what but everything turns out wrong.
BUT this recipe has given me back my will to bake. I tried this today for the very first time. I must admit that I didn’t read all the directions before starting so I didn’t realize at first how much dough I was getting myself into. I used my brand new kitchenaid (An engagement present from my grandmother) to make it, including the kneading because I was a tad too busy to knead by hand. I think I added a lot more flour than it calls for but they turned out fluffy and giant. I think I made them a lot bigger than you did but they are amazing! I am so happy I found this and even happier that you put this recipe out there on the internet for poore souls like me! Thank you so much! I am now going to be reading everything you post! You are a baking genius!
Here is a picture of the loot I made from this recipe (minus 1 hamburger bun that my father in law couldn’t help but steal) This took me 3 baking sheets to do. I didn’t put anything in the picture for a size reference but that can of black olives is a typical can size of any other canned vegetables so that kinda shows how GIANT they are.https://www.flickr.com/photos/126731647@N05/16453545745/